The Mission to Stop Criminal Hackers

Koerner, Brenden I., Doug Pasternak, and David E. Kaplan. "Can Hackers Be Stopped?" U.S. News & World Report, May/June, 46-50. 14 June 1999. Academic Search Complete. EBSCO. Web. 10 Apr. 2011.

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Koerner’s article is definitely a call for attention in the field of cyber security. He has a variety of professional computer security officials that have made statements involving the risks behind these criminal hackers, which have come to be known as “crackers” in the cyber-security world. Scott Charney, the chief of the Department of Justice's Computer Crime and Intellectual Property Section was quoted on the topic of catching these expert “crackers”, he says "Some very good hackers are serving time." But he also admits that authorities are certainly playing catch-up. Top-notch hackers that create their own programs and have virtually undetectable encryptions will continue to go unnoticed. Koerner also notes that society doesn’t understand the dangers behind the motives of many of these “crackers”. Major corporations often allow their major losses from system breaches to go unreported in order to avoid bad publicity. Koerner emphasizes that the best hackers in the world, are the bad guys. They are also the hackers that continue to go undetected, therefore citizens don’t read about them. The main purpose of this article is simply a call for attention to the subject at hand and inspiring more research from the good guys to stop these professional criminal hackers before they cause more damage to our economy.

Although this article does not address the research question by giving information to pick a certain side of the issue, it does equip the audience to answer the question. Rather than going into detail about whether government interference is necessary or not, this article strongly emphasizes the dangers of the criminal hackers and the complexity of their strategies. Reading Koerner’s article certainly makes the audience feel a sense of urgency and a certain understanding of what is really going on. Major corporations aren’t even reporting major losses in fear of losing customer confidence. This makes readers feel threatened because there is an “unknown factor”. Rather than equipping readers to answer the question, this article is more so a reassuring source that forces readers to understand the significance of internet security. It doesn’t necessarily help answer the research question, but it certainly inspires concern into the audience thoughts, which should result in a more desperate search for the answers and solutions.